


Some and Now None (Of You)

by WednesdaysDaughter



Category: Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Acceptance, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Dreams, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Post-Movie(s), World War I, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-06
Updated: 2017-06-06
Packaged: 2018-11-09 16:01:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11107968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WednesdaysDaughter/pseuds/WednesdaysDaughter
Summary: "Is this Heaven?”Diana flinches away from the phantom warmth he radiates behind her. Home lies in front of her as if she’d never left and the smell of salt fills her nose. Nostalgia wars with heartbreak when he settles next to her: The blue of his eyes stealing her breath like the fathomless sea. Diana wants to hide in this moment until it becomes her only reality.She turns to face him and he mirrors her action without hesitation. Tears like liquid metal slide down her face when she reaches out to cup his face and she feels like a spike’s been driven between her ribs when he begins to fade.“You’re not real."





	Some and Now None (Of You)

**Author's Note:**

> This movie both destroyed and rebuilt me. 
> 
> I saw it for a second time today and had to write something. The title is taken from Lord Huron's 'The Night We Met'. If you want to cry, I suggest listening to it.

He comes to her in her dreams.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

The first night, Diana wakes screaming; power pouring off of her in golden waves that pull trees from their roots. Tears blind her with each frantic blink and it’s Charlie who rocks with her trembling frame: His accent made thicker by his own grief. Diana mumbles desperate prayers through her hiccups and the god of war is absent from the hymns playing in her mind. Skin hot to the touch, Diana eventually pushes Charlie off and swears until she can’t breathe beneath their worried stares.

She marches through their makeshift camp and paces until the sun peaks over the rolling hills.

It is quiet, unlike her torrential heart.

Chief offers Diana a charm the next night in hopes of soothing her dreams. She almost refuses, torn between the relief and the ache of seeing Steve’s face once more. He understands and suddenly Charlie isn’t the only one who sees ghosts.

They all do.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

“Is this Heaven?”

Diana flinches away from the phantom warmth he radiates behind her. Home lies in front of her as if she’d never left and the smell of salt fills her nose. Nostalgia wars with heartbreak when he settles next to her: The blue of his eyes stealing her breath like the fathomless sea. Diana wants to hide in this moment until it becomes her only reality.

She turns to face him and he mirrors her action without hesitation.

Tears like liquid metal slide down her face when she reaches out to cup his face and she feels like a spike’s been driven between her ribs when he begins to fade.

“You’re not real,” she whispers and wakes with the ground frozen beneath her paralyzed body – the echoes of the crashing waves ringing in her ears.

Sammi offers her a hand up and feel of skin against skin sends Diana into shock, unaware of the wounded noises fleeing her mouth like wild birds locked in iron cages. His arms are strong as they wrap around her; knees week and dusted with dirt, she folds into herself and waits to see Steve’s face again.

“It was just a dream, Diana.”

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

Etta takes one look at her and knows.

“Right then, let’s get you cleaned up.”

Diana cannot find the words and Etta doesn’t press for them. She ushers Diana around and sees the men off – they need a night to drink, to mourn, without a witness. Like a puppet, Diana moves where Etta gestures and does what she’s told. The hot water from the bath turns her skin pink for a second, but Diana does not feel its warmth. Cold has gathered beneath her breast and it won’t budge for even the hottest cup of tea.

“Drink up: It’ll soothe your mind.”

The words are caught in Diana’s throat, so she washes them down until she’s drowning. Etta’s eyes are kind and dull with their own sadness and it’s the wilted smile on her face that breaks Diana of her silence.

“He stopped the war,” she chokes and Etta’s laugh is just as strained.

“Of course he did, bloody hero.”

They cry into each other’s shoulders until the clock chimes ten times and Etta ushers Diana into her spare room.

“The city’s going to celebrate tomorrow. The war is officially over – we should pay our respects, if you’re up for it of course.”

“Of course,” Diana replies halfway asleep and she misses Etta’s quick ‘goodnight’ in time to see the golden sands of Themyscira.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

“Are you sure this isn’t Heaven?”

Diana chuckles softly and leans against the withered ledge out looking paradise. Statues of the Gods bracket them and Diana remembers asking her mother to see the God-Killer. It feels like a lifetime ago now since she was so young and innocent.

Was her desire to save the world a gift from her father, Zeus, or was it simple naivety born of the greatness that surrounded her? Perhaps, it was both.

Steve stands beside her facing the sun and Diana watches his eyes slide close until his lashes dust his rosy cheeks; an imitation of the kisses she placed upon them in Veld. Her hand tangles with his and he startles at her gesture before looking down. He squeezes and Diana’s breath hitches as the color slowly fades around them. She doesn’t want to go.

Desperate, Diana flings herself from the ledge and wraps her arms around Steve and wills herself to stay. Her name falls from his lips and she clings tighter until her arms ache.

She wakes up, cold and alone of the floor, tangled in her sheets and Etta bursts through the door with a frying pan hoisted above her head, poised for an attack. The sight jars Diana for a second and when the laughter starts she is unable to stop. She laughs until she cannot breathe and when she hears Steve’s laughter in her ears she forgets where she is and continues laughing until she dissolves into a puddle of tears.

Etta watches stunned at the sight of Diana clutching the front of her shirt; rocking back and forth a tangled mess of hair and tears. The tempestuous display moves Etta to Diana’s side where she gathers Diana into her arms and hushes her until the storm finally passed.

Hours later finds them in a crowd of hundreds: People shouting victory as they held their loved ones and waved flags until their arms ached. Lovers kissed in the streets and parents clung to their children as Diana let their joy wash over her. When Charlie pressed the picture of Steve into her hands before they parted Diana’s smile left those who saw it breathless.

“Thank you Charlie,” Diana curled the photograph into her chest and felt it beat against her palm as if reminding her she was alive. His watch, a heavy weight on her wrist, ticked in time with her pulse and Diana felt as warm as she did when she fought Ares.

It wasn’t a heat born of anger though; it was born of love.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

“Is this a dream?” she asks him softly.

Snow falls silently outside and the fire cackles across the room. Diana curls her body around his and admires the way the light plays across his bare chest; slightly slick from sweat. His arm, trapped beneath her neck, pulls her closer until Diana’s face rests against his shoulder and she closes her eyes and breathes him in.

She listens for a heartbeat and tries not to cry when she hears nothing. Not even her memories will let her lie to herself; Steve Trevor is dead and this is torture.

“I don’t know,” Steve replies when the fire begins to die and the cold creeps into the room. Diana does not have the strength for more tears so she pulls away and ignores the way he pulls at her arm.

“Diana, look at me,” he begs and she feels nothing.

“No.”

“Diana, please,” his voice is far away.

“No,” Diana whispers into her empty London bedroom, gray and dull without Steve to breathe life into it.

“No more dreams.”

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

Twenty years pass and war comes again.

There is no god to kill this time, but that doesn’t stop Diana. She marched with Etta for women’s rights and now she marches with soldiers too young to hold guns. Wonder Woman was born in No Man’s Land two decades ago, but she is given life on D-Day in the heart of Normandy. Diana fights on the lines and off – although politics bore her to tears, she still tries to reason with men content to sit behind desks while their men die.

She is alone on the battlefield.

Whether out of self-preservation or not, Diana keeps the men of every company she visits at arm’s length. They do not sing like Charlie or make her laugh like Sammi: They do not know her like Chief or love her like Steve. She learns a little of first aid from the nurses and their passion, their ferocity, reminds her of home.

Day turn to months and when V-E Day comes Diana collapses in an empty foxhole and weeps. For a moment violent despair grips her until all she can do is recall the helplessness she once felt in a desolate Veld and a burning airfield. Their deaths meant nothing; war will always come.

A medic finds Diana four hours later and he helps her to an aid station where she dreams of the ‘I love you’ she never said and the man who took her heart with him.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

“Does it really matter?”

The stars are bright above them with only the endless sea surrounding the boat. Diana huffs into the night and turns back to face Steve whose eyes are bright with unshed tears: She is quick to cup his face and their foreheads knock gently together. They’re adrift in a memory that refuses to end as they trade breaths between them with eyes locked; both afraid to blink.

He feels more real than ever and it breaks Diana’s heart when he turns his head to kiss her palm tenderly. She wants to pull him into her chest and keep him safe behind her steel ribs yet to be broken by a god’s fury.

“I suppose not,” she surrenders, but it’s the wrong answer. Or perhaps, it’s the wrong time.

Reluctantly Steve pulls away and Diana’s protests are lost on the wind and suddenly she’s alone in a boat with no destination.

It is not the first time she wakes alone and it won’t be the last.

She feels this pain keenly.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

Immortality is lonely.

Diana watches her friends die and funds their legacies to the best of her ability. She fades into myth; declared a shared illusion by men dying in the trenches and it doesn’t bother her. The Gods also passed into legend, so it’s fitting she does too.

She moves around to avoid suspicion, hides in the shadow of requisition, but eventually someone pays attention and her past is brought to the front once more with an attachment. Four ghosts stare at her through a computer screen and Diana feels eons older than she is. She owes Bruce Wayne nothing and she is tempted to tell him so. Maybe it is Steve’s steady stare that stops her, or maybe it is the memory of his smile afterwards that warms the corners of her heart enough to tell Bruce, “Perhaps, one day.”

When he sends her the original copy, Diana cries for the first time that night in years, sweaty and sore from battle. Her shield falls from her heavy arms and her eyes blur with tears as she fumbles with the locks on the suitcase. She needs to see his face.

The glass is ice cold against her chest as she cradles it gingerly and weeps without reservation. Diana is frightened of where she’ll go tonight, but with Steve’s name on her lips she falls into sleep’s dark spell and when her ears begin to ring she nearly launches herself out of bed to run away.

Anything but this: Anything but here.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

“I wish we had more time.”

“No!” Diana shouts and digs her hands into Steve’s jacket, “I will not let you go. You cannot.”

“Diana,” Steve begins, but she does not stop.

“No Steve! It won’t do any good. There will be another war and another. I have seen so many, Steve it never ends!”

Her palms begin to burn and fire races through her veins as Steve tries to pull away from her grip. She will set them both aflame with her rage, but there is no Ares there to egg her on, just her own fury that’s been hiding deep inside her heart: It threatens to consume her.

“Diana, look at me.”

Steve cups her face with firm hands and Diana fights to keep her eyes open, but they slide close without her consent. She is not ready for this; not again. She cannot say goodbye again. She wasn’t ready the first time and maybe she never will be.

“Diana, it’s okay.”

Drenched in sweat, Diana wakes and decides to stay home.

The world will not crumble in a day.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

War is coming; relentless and unforgiving.

Steve comes to her one last time.

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

They are swaying.

“You are so close,” she murmurs into the frigid air.

“Not close enough,” Steve sighs before closing the distance between them and Diana melts into the kiss. In dreams she doesn’t need to breathe, so she pours all that she is into what she knows will be their last kiss. She can feel it as surely as she can feel the way his heart beats against her palm. In this moment, this memory – this dream – he is alive enough to love her the way she wants to be: The way she needs to be.

His name falls from her lips like a prayer and Steve reciprocates in kind, chanting a mantra of ‘Diana’ every time their lips part only to come together again and again and again.

She loses count and his hands burn against her back as he presses her closer. Her heart races in time with his and when the time comes it’s easier to let him go than she would’ve thought. His eyes twinkle in the light from the tavern and his smile feeds the steady glowing embers in her heart ‘til they burst into a mighty flame.  

His eyes trace the smile across her lips before stealing another kiss that doesn’t feel like a goodbye.

“I love you,” she confesses and with those words a weight vanishes from her chest as if it never existed in the first place.

Steve’s face begins to glow and Diana watches as a tear slides down his right cheek only to vanish when it hits his blinding grin. He ducks his head, as if embarrassed and when he looks up and their eyes met Diana knows he can see her stray tears as well.

“That’s a relief,” he chuckles and Diana cannot help but laugh too. He reaches out and takes her hands in his, slowly bringing them to his lips where he kisses her knuckles softly. It’s then that Diana sees a figure move behind them, but it does not alarm her as it would in the waking world. Somehow she’s always known who has granted her these visits.

“There’s my ride,” Steve jerks his head back and lets their hands fall to their sides before taking a hesitant step backwards, away from Diana.

There are a million things Diana wants to say, but instead she smiles and nods her head and watches Steve Trevor walk out of her life again.

“Thank you Uncle.”

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

Sunlight streams in through the double doors as dust dances in the air above her bed.

Diana rises slowly and stretches her arms high above her and imagines being able to touch the clouds in the realm where her father once lived. The robe billows around her legs as she leans against the golden railing and watches the city awaken. Eyes closed, Diana faces the sun and inhales slowly, recalling her gift with perfect clarity.  

The feel of his stubble against her face, the low sound of his laugh, and the way his eyes saw into the very depths of her soul.

It is there that Diana; Princess of Themyscira makes a promise to a ghost.

“One day we will not have to say goodbye. We will have our time.”

 

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

And they do.

**Author's Note:**

> I felt like including Zeus wouldn't work here, so instead I called upon Hades because if anyone could help her say goodbye properly to Steve, it's him. Yeah, I know the Gods are supposed to be dead, but I'd rather think of them off healing in a realm far, far removed from it all: Reaching out only when truly needed and if Diana's grief isn't a good enough reason I don't know what is.
> 
> To say that this movie changed me is an understatement. I could sit her and wax poetic about it until the cows came home, but honestly my heart is still recovering and although writing this helped, it also hurt. I hope I was able to do Diana and Steve justice.


End file.
